Note: Bill passed away on October 19, 2012 at the age of
86. His contributions to the world of film are many, and he generously provided
sponsorship for the digitization and uploading of his films (click the links
immediately below). He will be missed by all of us. Read author
Elmore Leonard's reminiscences on working with
Bill.

William F.Deneen, as writer, director, cameraman, film
executive, and founder of the Learning Corporation of America, is an
instrumental figure in revolutionizing the classroom academic film. Bill's career
began as a writer, director,
cameraman, and adventurer began
first with his own company. He later became Vice President in charge of Production at
Encyclopedia Britannica Films, considered by educational film historians to
be among the most significant companies of the era. It was in 1967, however,
that he founded Learning Corporation of America (LCA), as a Division of
Columbia Pictures Corp., and created a company that changed the face of
Educational Film by producing films that for the first time, on a large scale,
mirrored the social and ethnic diversity of the classroom.
View selected LCA films online.

One innovation spearheaded by Deneen was the use of well
known professional actors from theatrical films and television as well as
writers and directors from the entertainment media. Prior to the advent of LCA,
most educational film had been made by academics and specialists in various
subject areas. Another Deneen project was the founding of Highgate Pictures,
whose "After School Specials" were produced for major television networks and
later distributed to schools and libraries. Highgate also produced many
high-quality mini series for television networks.

He was born in July 25, 1926 in Portland, Maine, to Frank
Deneen, a paper merchant, and Marguerite Miller Deneen, whose love of the arts
captivated her son at an early age. Bill Deneen's filmmaking careerbegan at the age of 10 when his
mother gave him a 16mm camera. The family had a summer home in Northern
Michigan where in 1936 he wrote a script, cast a film with friends, and shot a
silent he called ‘Do You Take Ice From Charlie?’ In the 1950's, after college,
he formed his own company where he wrote, directed, produced, and often shot
camera on a very large number of documentary films for the major networks,
Encyclopaedia Britannica Films, National Geographic, and others, including five
films for the
Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME) for whom he shot prizewinning
documentaries on life in a leper colony in Kiangtong, Burma, ‘The Touch of His
Hand’ and ‘The Happy City.’ His University of Detroit Jesuit High School friend
Elmore Leonard also wrote the scripts for several of Deneen's early films.

Deneen lived an arduous, adventurous, and sometimes
dangerous life while making films, traveling to over a hundred different
countries, often alone in developing nations, on low budgets,
leaving his wife and three sons behind in Michigan. He would often fly his own
plane loaded with hidden film and camera equipment into desolate airstrips to
avoid unscrupulous customs officials. Once, while filming a little-known tribe
in the Amazon, his canoe overturned and he was attacked by piranhas. As he swam
wildly ashore the natives stood howling with laughter on the riverbank. In
Burma, insurgents tried to capture him as a hostage. In the outback of Australia
he lived with Aborigines, and nearly drowned in a tin mine in Malaya. His films,
many of which were edited by Grace Garland Janicz,
were filmed in many countries, won numerous national and international awards.

'Eskimo Family', Baffin Island, 1959
Sydney, Australia

In November, 1965, Encyclopaedia Britannica Films bought
Deneen's company and he was persuaded to move to Chicago as Britannica's Vice
President in charge of production. After a couple of years working in a
difficult and unfamiliar corporate structure, Bill responded to call from
Columbia Pictures which wanted to diversify and enter the then booming
government-funded educational film world. He persuaded Columbia that to succeed,
they should build a new kind of company and make a new kind of film aimed at
more diversified markets, utilizing professional filmmaking talent from the
entertainment media, as well as academics and subject matter experts who had
customarily made classroom
films.

Deneen argued that production budgets would have to be
considerably increased, but costs would be much more than offset by increased
sales and new markets. The new company was named Learning Corporation of
America, and headquartered in New York City, in the Columbia Pictures building. LCA became the quintessential
educational film company on the 1970's. Insightful, tender, hard hitting, and
occasionally off-beat, the social films produced and/or distributed by LCA in
the late 1960's to the mid 1980's served as a bellwether indicative of the
massive social changes occurring in the United States. Acquisition of films by
schools and libraries was increasingly funded by public laws such as the
Elementary and Secondary Educational Act (ESEA) of 1965 which helped make the
new LCA kind of film possible. Within a relatively short time the new company
became highly successful and profitable outselling most of its much longer
established competitors.

Many of the writers, directors, and actors who participated
in LCA films came from the theatrical film world. Among them were directors
Peter Medak, John Irvin, Richard Marquand, and actors Michael Douglas, Anthony
Hopkins, Glynis Johns, Maureen Stapleton, Paul Sorvino, John Hurt, Charles Gray,
Christopher Plummer, James Woods, Butterfly McQueen, and Christian Slater.

Much of Bill Deneen's talent was in utilizing the
tremendous assets of Columbia Pictures for schools and libraries. A prime
example was the ‘Searching for Values’ series, an elegantly-edited group of
films taken from Columbia Features films, including ‘Bridge on the River Kwai,’
‘On the Waterfront,’ ‘All the King's Men,’ ‘The Swimmer,’ and ‘To Sir with
Love.’ LCA’s titles included films made by Bert Salzman,
whose ‘Angel and Big Joe’ winner of the 1975 Academy Award for Best Short
Subject. LCA films won hundreds of other awards world wide.

LCA also set the standard for excellence in the marketing
of its films, from the richly-hued indigo film cans embossed with its logo, to
a series of striking catalogues that were often given Dewey Decimal Numbers and
deposited on library shelves. Lesson plans written by educational theorists such
as John Matoian (who later headed Home Box Office), inserted in LCA's film cans,
provided top notch instructional objectives for teachers, who often used LCA
films as prime resources in teaching ethics, history, and diversity.

To modern audiences, many LCA films resonate as strongly
today as they did when they were made reflecting Bill's insistence on top talent
and production values. Geoff Alexander, director of the Academic Film Archive of
North America, cites LCA as the company that was the exemplar in providing
exceptional films that closely mirrored the educational changes that took place
in American education in the late 1960's and 1970's. Mr. Alexander states:
"Looking at these films today, the themes still resonate with audiences of all
ages, and many, from a production and thematic perspective, are absolutely
timeless. From all appearances, they could have been made yesterday."

In the early 1980's educational film funding began to erode
and Columbia also faced financial problems, being forced to sell many of its
assets. LCA was sold to the W.F.Hall Printing Company of Chicago which was soon
bought by the giant Mobil Oil Corporation, and LCA became a subsidiary of Mobil.
Soon after the Mobil acquisition, and with diminishing educational markets, Bill
Deneen founded Highgate Pictures to produce for television and feature film
markets. Highgate soon became commercially successful, producing a long stream
of network after school specials, made for TV movies such as ‘The Gentleman
Bandit,’ ‘Summer of My German Soldier,’ and long form mini-series like ‘Chiefs’
and ‘Harem.’

In 1987 the Mobil board of directors ordered Mobil to get
out of all non energy related businesses, including Montgomery Ward and LCA/Highgate.
Deneen personally bought his companies in a difficult buyout, and soon sold them
again to New World Pictures which went on to sell and re-sell the LCA/Highgate
library of over 500 films produced over a period of nearly 20 years.

Partial
Filmography

While
primarily known as an executive and executive producer, Deneen made a number of
memorable films as an individual filmmaker. He shot the original footage on
Ektachrome Commercial film (reversal color stock), which was then transferred to
a master color negative. Prints for distribution were then made from the
master. Of these, a Kodachrome answer print was made for Deneen's own
collection. Distribution prints were made on a less-expensive film stock,
typically
Eastmancolor, which eventually
color-shifted toward the magenta spectrum, ensuring that extant Deneen's in
today's media libraries lave lost much of their original color. Deneen credits
much of his success as a filmmaker to the exacting film editing done by Grace Garland Janisz.

The following eight films were made for institutions affiliated with the
Catholic Church

Touch of His Hand
The (1956, for the Pontifical Institute for Foreign
Missions)Happy City The (1959,
for the Pontifical Institute for Foreign
Missions)Latitude Zero (1961,
Deneen here accompanies a Franciscan priest, Santarem-based Juvenal Carlson, and
his boat 'Pio,' as they ply the backwaters of the Amazon River. There are many
ethnographic elements to the film, one of the most notable of which is a
ceremony in which a man stands in the sun, his hand being eaten by soldier ants,
in a village ritual. Deneen was attacked by piranhas and bitten during the
filming. Made for the Pontifical Institute for Foreign
Missions)Heart of a Man, The (for the Pontifical Institute for Foreign
Missions)Little Ones, The ("Presents an experience with Southeast Asia's
children, thousands of whom are abandoned, starved or even killed each year.
Tells the story of thousands like little Sumi who is superstitiously accused and
condemned to be drowned because she is thought to be the cause of the plague
raging in her village." Filmed in Hong Kong for the Pontifical Institute for
Foreign Missions, narrated by Loretta Young))Man Who Has Everything, The (made in the Amazon basin, for Franciscan order,
written by Elmore Leonard )Secret, The (1964, written by Elmore Leonard and featuring Bill Deneen's
children, for Parish Tithing, Inc.)Threshold of Terror ("Shows the famous Lo-Wu bridge on the Hong
Kong-Red China border, the real threshold of terror, over which millions of
Chinese refugees have fled from communist tyranny. Presents the story of these
brave people and their plight." Made for the Catholic Film Center).

Arts and Crafts of Mexico I (1961)
Arts and Crafts of Mexico II (1961)Atlantic Crossing: Life on an Ocean Liner (1967)
Australia: The Land and the People (1959)
Bread (2nd ed.) (1960) Script by Elmore Leonard
Britain: Searching for a New Role (1964)
British Isles: Land & People (1963)
Burma: People of the River (1957)
Canada's Royal Canadian Mounted Police (1961)
Claudius: Boy of Ancient Rome (1964) Script by Elmore Leonard
Cotton Farmer, The (1963)
Danube Valley and Its People, The (1964) Script by Elmore Leonard
Egypt: Cradle of Civilization (1962)Eskimo Family (1959)
France in the New World: Colonial Life in Canada (1963, script believed to be
written by Elmore Leonard)French and Indian War, The: Seven Years War in America
(1962) Script by Elmore LeonardFrontier Boy of the
Early Midwest (1962) Script by Elmore Leonard
Hawaii: The 50th State (1959)
Hungary and Communism: Eastern Europe in Change (1964)Indonesia: New Nation of Asia (1959)
Japan: Harvesting the Land and Sea (1963)Japan: Miracle in Asia (1963)Japanese Boy: the Story of
Taro (1963)
Julius Caesar: The Rise of the Roman Empire (1964) Script by Elmore Leonard
Life in Ancient Rome (1964) Script by Elmore Leonard
Malaya : Land of Tin and Rubber (1957)
Mexican Boy: Story of Pablo (1961)
Mexico: The Land and the People (1961)
Nile Valley and its People, The (1962)
Philippines, The: Land and People (1960)Puerto Rico: Its Past, Present, and Promise
(1965) Script by Elmore LeonardScandinavia: Norway, Denmark and Sweden (1961)
Spain in the New World: Colonial Life in Mexico (1961, script believed to be
written by Elmore Leonard)Spanish Children, 2nd Ed (1964,
script believed to be written by Elmore Leonard)
Suez Canal: Gateway to World Trade (1962)
Thailand: Land of Rice (1957)
West Indies (1965)
'Westward Movement, The' series:
- Settlers of the Old Northwest Territory (1962, written by Elmore
Leonard)
- Settlement of the Mississippi Valley (1962, written by Elmore Leonard)

In one way or another involved with the production of most films in the LCA
catalog, and all Highgate Pictures output.

On the Amazon River, filming 'Latitude Zero'

Additional technical note on the process used by Deneen to make a film,
which was standard for the era. It consisted of the following
steps:

1. Most films of the era were shot on either 16mm
Commercial Ekatachrome reversal color film or on Kodachrome. The difference
being Ektachrome was a faster film needing less light and was less contrasty
making it more suitable for making release prints.
2. From the camera original a color reversal work print
was made for editing purposes. The edited work print was then conformed to the
camera original by matching edge numbers carried on both films.
3. From the conformed original color reversal film, a Kodachrome "answer print" was made and then a master color negative from which
to print color positive release prints.
4. Often when a large number of release prints were needed
a 32mm negative was made for printing. This negative was then slit and split
into two for making prints.
5. Sound was transferred from the mixed 16mm magnetic
track to a master optical sound negative for making release prints.
6. DeLuxe or Consolidated Labs were usually the ones who
handled the big print orders for Deneen's EB films.